International conference focusing on multipurpose national ID card system in India

National ID Cards Present Big Opportunity for Business
(Shri S. Regupathy, Minister of State for Home Affairs)

NEW DELHI, 15 JULY 2004 -- The creation and issuing of electronic national identity cards presents a huge business opportunity for Indian enterprises in providing the expertise, positioning of biometrics data on the cards, manufacturing and distributing machines to read these cards, storage and access to the national database and other aspects, Shri S. Regupathy, Minister of State for Home Affairs, said here today at the 4th Smart Card Tech 2004 international conference organised by Exhibitions India.

Focusing on national identity instruments for citizens of the country is very important in these days of terrorism, militancy and infiltration by foreign elements intending on destabilizing governments and even countries. The question remains how to identify infiltrators. Regupathy said, " We must issue identity cards to Indian citizens so that the in future infiltrators could be known without too much fuss." A pilot scheme by the MNIC is currently in progress.

Dismissing all doubts regarding the ability of the government to issue a billion multipurpose identity cards to citizens, the Minister said that the use of electronic voting machines in the entire election process had boosted the self-confidence of the nation in this regard. "This experience strengthens our confidence that the job can be done," he added. However, he cautioned that no other country in the world had attempted such an exercise on such a large scale so far.

The multipurpose national ID cards would have to be a national task in which the public and private sectors must join hands. Only a partnership model would enable such a huge task to be undertaken and finished within a short time frame. The private sector should realize this as a great business opportunity. "We need the expertise in India on making of these cards, the etching of biometrics data on them, and making them completely fool proof. We also need machines to read these cards and check them against the national database," the minister added. According to him, once this entire process has been successfully implemented, the national security environment is bound to improve tremendously.

Delivering the keynote, Kanwar Pratap Singh, Additional Secretary - BM, Ministry of Home Affairs said that the conference's timing could not have been better. He disclosed that the pilot project in preparing and issuing multipurpose national identity cards had revealed great enthusiasm among the people. The pilot project has so far covered 3 million people. He added: "We've also been to cover 75 percent of the population in terms of finger printing and photography. In some areas, it has even been over 85 percent. People have been seen queuing up from early morning for finger printing. This compared even more favourably when we consider that the public response to the voter-identity cards even in urban areas was very poor." He expected the database work of citizens in the pilot project area to be completed in two to three months and will be available centrally immediately.

A unique number will be made available to each one of these citizens. Singh said: "It is necessary for a project of this dimension to provide first rate security. Its uniqueness must be maintained. Data on smart cards is bound to increase as it is used more. India being a price sensitive market, cost could be a deterring factor. Therefore, the card should be cost effective. Larger numbers will provide the economies of scale. Capacities of such dimensions are not readily available off-the-shelf and have to be created in India and/or abroad." He hoped that the entire process would be completed in one go and covers the entire population over the next 12-18 months.

Over 5,000 centers for data integration would be made available and more data would be added on as the project progresses, he added. He assured that the national ID cards would be cost effective and for this public-private partnership would be promoted.

The Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India, Jayant Kumar Banthia, said the conference aimed to meet the different objectives of security through technology and facilities of e-governance through identity. He said: "Security is when every citizen would have a foolproof national identity card. It will make security easier and facilitate delivery of e-governance to citizens. This exercise is a serious step to set up a unique database in the country."

The special significance of this project was the creation of a national register of citizens and allotting a unique identification number for each and every citizen. This number would help identification for delivering other government services also, apart from helping national security by isolating infiltrators. The ongoing pilot project was creating a database of 3 million people in 13 states in the border areas.

Banthia said: "This is a huge initiative. If we can create a win-win situation for everyone, we would like to bring out a model where the Indian industry takes and picks up the challenge, so that the Indian government does not have to look beyond borders for various things."

Earlier, welcoming the minister, speakers, delegates and other participants to the 4th Smart Card Tech India, Prem Behl, managing director, Exhibitions India Pvt. Ltd., said the event explored business opportunities for everyone concerned. "We have assembled people working in different areas of this technology to discuss several issues. One issue is that of privacy and how to protect the individual and how to protect an individual if all the information is available in one card. There are issues concerning encryption as well. We are here as catalysts to encourage pro-active decision making and execute action."

According to R. Chandrashekhar, Joint Secretary (E-Governance), Ministry of Communications and IT, the issue of multipurpose national identity cards would help government in effectively targeting the welfare measures to the beneficiaries. Though these cards were being issued more for security reasons, there was this angle of other benefits from them also. However, there were "monumental problems" in creating and verifying a national database of citizens, providing authenticated access to it, keeping it in a secure environment, updating it and protecting the privacy of the citizens regarding the data available in it.

The 4th Smart Card Tech India 2004, international conference focused on the multipurpose applications of smart cards in the context of national security and to use them in the promotion of e-governance.

The discussions were based on the government-to-citizen (G2C) interface in the backdrop of the Rs.2, 250 crore national e-governance action plan for 2003- 07. Critical issues deliberated were the ID initiatives facing the government for increasing homeland security, the role of advanced smart card technologies, biometrics, IT vendor communities and their role in supplementing the government's efforts in national security operations.

The 4th Smart Card Tech India 2004 provided the platform for understanding the investment opportunities, growth areas and collaboration networks among the key stakeholders and partners. The focus is on the areas of interoperability, infrastructure, privacy, security and cost.

Eminent speakers at the conference included: Dr. Ajay Dua, IAS, Director General, Employees State Insurance Corp. Ltd., Shri Rajeev Talwar, IAS, Commissioner cum Secretary - Transport, Department of Transport, Mr. Wim Tappij Gielen, Vice President - EMEIA, Datacard Ltd., Mr. Sanjeev Shriya, Managing Director, Smart Chip Ltd., Mr. Sanjay Dharwadker, Managing Director, AKS Smart Card Systems Ltd, Mr. V. V. Rajasekhar, CIO, ITC Limited, Mr Heinz Lanner, Senior Manager, Infineon Technologies, Mr. Anurag Gupta, Chief Executive, A Little World Pvt Ltd & Mr. Amit Rao, Head - ST Incard, STMicroelectronics India, Dr K Subramanian, Dy. Director General, NIC & IT Advisor to CAG of India, Mr. Y. D. Wadaskar, Managing Director, WYSE Biometrics Systems Pvt. Ltd, Mr Alok Shende, Director - Technology Consulting Practice, Frost & Sullivan India, Mr. Ashok Sunder Rajan, Embedded Systems Design Specialist, Gemplus Asia Pacific. Mr. Mohit Gopal Rampal, Assistant AGM-India Sales Operations, Rainbow Information Technologies Pvt. Ltd.

The Office of the Registrar General, Government of India is the COHOST of the 4th Smart Card Tech India 2004 international conference. The Indian Association for Medical Informatics is the co-sponsor.

The globally known growth consultancy firm Frost & Sullivan is the Knowledge Partner.The event is also endorsed by Global Platform, UK.

The sponsors for the event include AKS Smart Card systems Ltd. (Platinum sponsor), Smart Chip Ltd., Data Card Group, Infineon Technologies and SafeNet (Associate sponsors).